MFD offers smoke detector replacement, tips

The McPherson Fire Department issued their bi-annual reminder to check the batteries in smoke detectors with the end of Daylight Savings over the weekend.

More importantly, though, fire chief Jeff Deal wants to make sure everyone has a smoke detector, to begin with.

“If you are an individual who is in need, both financially or physically, assistance with your smoke detector, we do have a smoke detector giveaway program,” Deal said.

The fire department has three separate funding sources to help provide the smoke detectors, so they should be able to meet any need, according to Deal. Those sources do focus mainly on the elderly or the young.

“If you have children in your house, or are elderly and unable to install smoke detectors, please come by the fire department and fill out an application,” Deal said. “Once you fill out the application, we'll determine which funding source to pull from. And then we will send a couple of firemen out to your house and have them install the smoke detectors in the most appropriate location in your home.”

Newer smoke detectors have built-in, 10-year lithium batteries, which Deal says means they won't need to be changed out but once a decade.

When the battery is changed from older models of smoke detectors, it is recommended that you take the plastic cap from the new nine-volt battery and place it on the terminals of the old one.

“If any piece of metal crosses between those two junctions, it will actually generate electricity, which causes heat,” Deal said. “We have some fires pop up from discarded nine-volt batteries.”